


Honor Duels

by Inay



Category: World of Warcraft
Genre: Other, Transgender, blood elf
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-29
Updated: 2020-08-29
Packaged: 2021-03-06 19:07:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26173942
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Inay/pseuds/Inay
Kudos: 2





	Honor Duels

_ He was eighteen the day Cousin Araphant put a sword in his hands and taught him the rules of honor duels. It did not feel natural and right, not in the way it would feel for a young sibling much later, still so far from even existing. But it was a tool. He had no title, but his blood was noble enough he could challenge his ‘betters’, as long as he won.    
It was a tool, to earn his place, to defend his own, and it was a challenge. So Aranel learned. _

_ He was thirty-four the first time he actually challenged another. Yes the Silversun were traders and merchants, and lordling Mirthburn was that, a noble. But it had been a mistake to insult Aranel and thinks he’d be cowed by the insinuations on his parentage. It was his first duel. _

_ She was a hundred and fourty, flame on her fingertips and a name she had chosen, the first time it actually mattered. The first time she had used the tools learned so early to defend someone else, and he was hers, and he was her brother’s, they had no right to touch him. She still bears no scar. _

_ She was three hundreds and seven when she had lost her brother to the Game, chased away for having dared to love above his station, because Lady Falculaire would not suffer any will to oppose hers. She saw how close it had been to also lose her best friend. She’s holding a sobbing elf when she considers she will need more subtle tools to challenge the Lady.  _

_ She was three hundreds and thirty, and she still fought for her friend with all the tools she learned. A sword sometimes, and she delighted in sprinkling some insults toward his house even as she left scars in his name. More often with words as sharp as the blade. This was a longer game. _

_ She was three hundreds and sixty when she was congratulated for her work, offering such a polite smile to Lady Falculaire across the room, and her deepest condolences. Such a shame the Falculaire bred mostly dullards, she’s certain the next generation might have some actual mages in it, that might be able to compete with her. _

_ She was three hundreds and ninety four when she saw her parents take the logical decision following two disappointing offsprings. She knows they love them. It still hurts to hear. There will be a third sibling to carry her Mother’s ambitions.  _

_ She was four hundreds and thirty nine when her world changed, a baby placed in her arms with instructions. “You will raise her.” She was still four hundreds and thirty nine when she begged her brother to come back home and help her. It is another sort of challenge. _

_ She was four hundreds and fifty five when her brother left again and left her with the child, back to human lands and away from a society that he could not truly rejoin again. The child grows and she misses him. She no longer uses a sword to fight. _

_ She was five hundreds and ten and the world no longer made sense. There was no more Quel’thalas, not truly, and death paved the streets. Her brother was dead, as were her parents, her family. No friend, only a child to care for. _

_ She was five hundred and fifteen, and she had lost the duel. It is a different sort of scar. _

_ She was five hundred and seventeen when she saw the sun again. Not her sun, not her home. But sun nonetheless.  _

_ She was five hundreds and twenty three, she crafted what might be her masterpiece in wards and runes and control. It looks like a sword.  _

  
  
  
  
  



End file.
